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General News

Shark Cage Diving, Gansbaai

written by Monique Fallows

Posted on Wednesday, 30 November 2011

I have had a bit of a shark drought since the Great white shark season ended at Seal Island in mid-September so when we had the opportunity to do some filming in Gansbaai I was really excited to see and cage dive with the great whites again.

We had to wait for good weather as we needed perfectly flat seas in order to work inshore, the summer haunt of the Great whites. When the day came we launched at 5.30am to make the most of the perfect conditions.

We had a fair wait of about an hour and a half before the first shark came up to the boat, but wow, after not seeing them for 2 and a half months I had forgotten the feeling they leave you with! It was beautiful to watch the first shark gently cruise effortlessly around the boat and I thought to myself how lucky I was to have a beautiful day to see a great white shark.

Soon the other shark cage diving boats came out to join us and even though there were a number of boats close to us we regularly had sharks up to the boat. Unfortunately the visibility was poor so it was difficult to cage dive and basically limited us to filming from the surface.

By the end of the day we ended up with 14 different Great white sharks, a remarkable number for what is thought to be the slower months for seeing sharks.

A lot of the sharks were really interactive and a number of them stayed with us on and off the whole day. An interesting observation was a number of occasions were the bait fish glancing off the sharks. Game fish have been observed to do this probably in order to remove parasites by moving against the roughness of the shark’s skin, but this is the first time we have seen the bait fish do it. It resulted in a lot of silver flashing around the sharks creating a unique sighting.

By the end of the day we ended up with 14 different Great white sharks, a remarkable number for what is thought to be the slower months for seeing sharks. So, right now is a great time for any of you thinking about shark cage diving with our sister company in Gansbaai this summer. It may even be a great idea for a Christmas present. We do provide vouchers so contact us now for a special gift for someone!